Google Glass Banned In Growing Number of Bars

In a potential backlash against digital surveillance, a bar in San Francisco has banned Google Glass from the establishment, coming on the heels of a woman posting a video of being assaulted in a bay area bar for wearing the glasses.

The Willows gastro pub in the South of Market neighborhood of San Francisco was quoted in a report saying “Our patrons have expressed concerns with being recorded while enjoying themselves at The Willows – kindly remove before entering.”

Woman alleges attack in bar for wearing Google Glass, posts video

The Willows notice comes after a tech reporter was attacked in a bar after refusing to stop wearing her Google Glass. In a brief video posted to YouTube of the event, Sarah Solcum, who wore the glasses, extensively wrote about it on her Facebook and Twitter accounts.

“This is the video that I got on Google Glass at Molotov bar on Haight Street after being verbally accosted and flicked off by the Asian looking girl, I turned on the video, and after I told them I was doing so they got pissed and came after me,” Slocum wrote in widely reported comments.

“Unfortunately, I had not extended the video so it cuts out after 10 seconds. Here you can see them — two people, a male and a female — trying to block the camera. The guy waving his hands in my face here later rips the Google Glass off my face and ran out of the bar,” she wrote.

Could the backlash against video surveillance in California bars be a trend?

A recent Washington Post poll found respondents are increasingly concerned with their privacy. Close to 70 percent of Americans are concerned about how much personal information government agencies and private companies collect, the poll found.

As trends are known to start in California, it will be interesting to see if the grassroots backlash against invasion of privacy can overcome the corporate and government trend of data collection of previously private information.